Saturday, June 4, 2011

An actor whose name became synonymous with "comic relief" during the late 1990s, Jamie Kennedy made his reputation playing a series of wise-asses in such films as the Scream trilogy and the independent comedy Clockwatchers. Born in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, on May 25, 1970, Kennedy showed comedic inclinations from an early age, and first became inspired to pursue an acting career when he was cast as an extra in Dead_Poets_Society (1989).

After high school, Kennedy moved to L.A., where he wanted to have a career as an extra. Unfortunately, Hollywood casting agents had other ideas, and the aspiring actor found himself working odd jobs ranging from a restaurant busboy to a gum-scraper at K-Mart. During this time, he also studied at the American/British Drama Academy and began finding stand-up work at various improv clubs. It was in one of these clubs that he caught the attention of an independent filmmaker and was subsequently cast in the little-seen The Legend of Flin Flon.

The actor's bona fide entry into the film industry came with a supporting role in Baz_Luhrmann's 1996 William_Shakespeare's_Romeo_+_Juliet, in which he played a fuchsia-haired thug. That same year he had a huge breakthrough in Wes_Craven's Scream, which cast him as a video store clerk with an unnerving lust for horror movies. The great success of the film opened a number of doors for Kennedy, one of which led to a memorable role as an office boy in Jill_Sprecher's well-received independent comedy Clockwatchers (1997), which also starred Lisa_Kudrow, Parker_Posey, and Toni_Collette. The actor also reprised his role for the inevitable Scream_2 (1997) and Scream_3 (2000) and appeared in such slacker extravaganzas as Bongwater and Starf*cker (both 1998).

Kennedy got a shot at more grown-up fare with a supporting role in David_O._Russell's acclaimed Gulf War drama Three_Kings (1999), and a turn as a movie studio gofer in the satirical Bowfinger (1999). His growing popularity was reflected in the number of projects he was involved with in 2000; included amongst them were Ben_Younger's The_Boiler_Room, in which Kennedy played an ambitious young stock broker, and The_Specials, an ensemble comedy that cast him as a member of a motley group of superheroes. Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi